[ in the frigid cold of stormhail, you and crick wellsley discover the body of vados the architect.
in a way, this confirms many of your suspicions. you have known for some time now that something terrible lurked within the order of the sacred flame - in fact, unveiling that truth has been your missive for five years now - and here, the evidence stands before you. the coverup of what must have been an assassination. (clearly so, considering someone tried to kill you mere seconds ago. crick leapt to your aid - perhaps you might rely on a godsblade such as me! he had shouted, all the picture of a valiant knight.
how you teased him about it, afterwards, playfully asking if crick would denounce his gods. and how he looked away, and said -
Temenos. I...wish to believe in the gods. As I wish to believe in you.)
but as the obvious to you finally becomes clear, you can tell it rattles crick. crick wellsley, godsblade (newly anointed); your by chance companion, a man who has pulled you out of trouble by your vestments more than once just by existing in your sphere. a pure hearted, endlessly good knight, a lost little lamb desperately in need of guidance. someone you have come to be quite fond of. you so rarely have friends. the travelers are an exception. but there's something special, here, something you aren't sure if you're ready to put your finger on.
he asked you if there was anything in this world he could have faith in, and you gave him the answer that keeps you moving, realistic, cynical, honest. "That you must find out for yourself. Though I must warn you, there are few things worthy of our faith."
and in his crick way, he calls you out on what is undeniable truth, that you don't have much faith in the gods. chosen cleric or otherwise, what you have faith in is the truth, the logical, the things that make sense. he knows this about you, but even so, he confesses his worries and his life story, tells you a fact that shocks you - that he met roi, once upon a time.
roi, a foundling just like you. roi, who was left at the church just like you were as a baby, raised under the loving care of the pontiff. roi, your brother, not in blood but in every other manner. and... you see so much of roi in crick: it's hard not to. they're both the same. honest. bright - so bright, they're hard to look at, sometimes. earnest. faithful. morally sound. the purest heart of the sacred flame.
but roi is gone, disappeared to the wind five years ago, and the young man who stands before you, eyes brimming with tears, tells you his dream is to cleave wickedness from the world. you can't help yourself but to poke holes in it, ever the cynic, just like you were for roi. just like you always were, for roi.
it's such a familiar conversation that you choose not to sit on it, for once. crick deserves a tiny bit of leeway, after everything you've put him through, and you push past your own guarded nature and pull the information like brambles out of your throat. casually, like it doesn't still feel like an open wound, you tell crick of roi's disappearance, and of the way he is the source of your cynicism and your realism, of the way you've mistrusted the church from the moment he disappeared, and how doggedly you searched for the truth for what happened to him ever since.
...something shines in crick's eyes when he speaks to you. he looks sad - upset, even, in the way he does when you remind him that his world of faith is not so clean and bright, but he agrees anyway. he really is learning, crick - you wonder if it's for the better or the worse, that you could be jading something so pure. honestly, crick admits, there are problems in the sacred guard, and immediately wants to jump to work.
...but talking about roi exhausts you. being vulnerable, allowing crick to see that side of you - it's like struggling to tread water. the weight of your sadness is harder and harder to bear, nowadays, no matter how easily you hide it behind your cassock. you fake an excuse about crick's injury from an earlier fight, reaching out to touch his arm, and crick calls you out on just wanting time alone. it stings, a little, to be so easily read, but it comes with a mix of pride and affection, and you compliment him on his perception, though you've been left feeling exposed. he leaves you for the night; you head to the inn for a night of tossing and turning, something close to what's called sleep.
--
in the morning, you awaken to a hubbub in the center of stormhail.
you've seen this hubbub before - the shocked crowds, the murmuring. someone died, last night - someone was murdered, and you imagine it had everything to do with the very same sacred guard and the truth you've been seeking all this time.
"That's one of them from the sacred guard, isn't it? How'd this happen?" says a concerned townsperson. another gasps, says a prayer. you ask them to move with a combination of politeness and your general aura as the inquisitor and stride through the crowd, which parts -
and once again, temenos, a part of your world shatters into pieces.
slumped up against the brick wall outside of the headquarters of the sacred guard is crick wellsley. his body is mangled; blood seeps through his white cloak and down into the white snow, down his white, lifeless face. by some miracle of aelfric, at least his eyes are closed.
your stomach does an unpleasant, horrible twist, and his name tears out of your mouth somewhere between horror and despair - "Crick!" - as you shove past the last of the crowd to drop to his side, to check his pulse. it's the same thing you felt when the pontiff died - that the healing magic you have mastered is useless, that this supposed gift you were given is pointless in the moments it matters the most. you press your fingers to crick's wrist. nothing. he's dead.
roi's disappearance, first. the pontiff, dead on the floor, mauled by a beast in his own cathedral. and now...
you don't really realize it, but like any number of mourners you've comforted before, you find yourself asking no one - why. the whammy of grief and frustration - why crick, of all people, even if you know the answer - burbles uselessly in the back of your brilliant brain, and it's as you're still holding his wrist that you notice the scrap of paper clutched tightly in crick's free hand. slowly, you uncurl his fingers, icy cold and stiff, and pull free what looks like a torn page from of a book, with a single line of writing.
"Surrender yourself not unto silent dusk. For the light shall fade."
it's the same words. the same ones scribbled onto a scrap of bloody paper in the pontiff's final book of scripture. it's a clue. it's a - it's information.
it's as you're holding this in your hand, eyes wide and head already starting to spin, that you hear the sacred guard bark at the crowd to leave. one in particular comes to the corpse, to you, and speaks with loathing. "What are you doing here?"
you snap at one of many useless crows that he's your friend, that you want to help with the investigation, but you're called dead weight, and the sacred guard scoffs and sends you away. you go, without protest, clutching the paper crick died for in your hand, safely stolen away from the prying eyes of the crows.
for a moment, you look past them. you think of crick, his beseeching eyes and naive, pure dream. his want to fix corruption, the way roi had, the way you want to. the last bastion of goodness left standing in the church of the sacred flame, the little lamb who you'd grown quite fond of, now struck down - a lamb in the den of the wolves - and you stare at the paper in your hand.
"Your clue is safe, and it was not laid out in vain. I will follow the path you've laid out before me."
and you do what you've done a hundred times in your life. you do what you did when you were standing at the body of the man who raised you, the only authority figure you've ever known and trusted. you do it now, at the body of your little lamb, who despite all the questioning you led him to, believed in you.
you close your eyes, and you tap into yourself, and say: ] The truth...lies in the flame.
[ invocation spoken, you let the world around you fade away to blue. (visual. to 55:06 - 58:03.)
--
by now, this visualization technique is familiar enough to you, but there's something different about feeling the light of the sacred flame form the ghostly shape of crick wellsley. silent and unspeaking - they never speak, when you see them - he walks up to you, and waits patiently for your guidance.
you feel something heavy in your heart as he does - waiting to be guided, like always. a lost little lamb, expectant. waiting. you want him to be able to move on in peace. you close your eyes, in the midst of the visualization, and regard him after a slow, deep breath. Crick. I swear to you, I will carry on the work you were torn from yesterday.
...and so, you must be off.
crick's ghost gives a near imperceptible nod, then turns around and starts walking under your guidance. you follow him, follow the path that he takes, into the rooms of the sacred guard, into a library. his ghost shows you a book that's a little too worn, and he touches it - you do the same, thinking it might be the book that he tore the page from, but as you pull the book, it's just the scripture on the creation of the heavens and earth. you frown at something scrawled on the inside about the heavens and making the earth shake, and when you look up, crick's ghost is turning around and walking outside - you follow him.
you see him again up in the rafters, and realization hits you, followed by a rush of affectionate pride, followed by a hollow sort of sorrow. clever little lamb, who read the clue, who investigated the 'heavens', who leads you to a pressure plate on a tall column that opens a door in the stained glass paneling of the cathedral. you follow his path as he walks away - you can imagine his startled expression but you won't, and he leads you down the stairs and to the stained glass.
crick's ghost stands before the door, his back to you. for a moment, you feel like you're standing in your home again, watching roi disappear into the distant night, and you realize that this is it. the ghost stays still. he doesn't look back for even a second. you swallow.
...You became a true knight before you passed, Crick. No ordinary man would notice such a thing.
you feel the power of the sacred flame pulling away, and you roll your shoulders back, and exhale, and release. the world around you flickers, and the ghost, his mission complete, fades away into nothing, framed and translucent by the holy sacred light that leaks in through the glass...
...and you're standing in the too-silent cathedral alone, the world in its normal light, carrying only the ghosts you always do. ]
I'm going to find the truth, Crick. [ you say, out loud. his ghost is gone now, but you promise him anyway. ] The truth you were diligently working towards.
[ and you step off into the darkness.
in the belly of the proverbial beast, you find the book crick tore his page from - you find a secret library, and you find the deputy of the crows, who informs you with a cackle that it was the head of their ilk who killed crick - that he had to die because he knew too much. you, by leading him to the truth, led him straight to the lion's den.
you're so angry, suddenly. angry for the injustice of it all. angry for crick, angry for the pontiff, angry that your intuition about these gods-damned crows has always been right, angry enough that it shows on your face when you ask where kaldena is.
the deputy points it out, and mocks you. "Does it hurt, knowing your cute little assistant's been killed?"
you don't respond, lest she know that she's right. the deputy tells you cheerfully that kaldena's gone, and you have to die, that the hound must be brought to heel, and you draw the staff of judgement with a kind of quiet, holy fury that you never show. ]
Fine. [ you snap. you're so angry. you're so angry, and heartbroken, and - you have to keep moving forward. the truth waits for no grief. no sorrow. the truth lies in the flame. you take a battle stance; the other travelers follow behind. ] Seal your lips, you so called messenger of the divine
[ with the aid of the other travelers, you will walk out of here alive, and leave cubaryi dead on the floor.
because the truth, the truth that crick wellsley fought to find, must be brought to light. ]
[ i'm so tired i cannot hope to match this but by golly was it gorgeous and my heart aching for gays i have never known myself.
nodd, too. a romantic, underneath the caked on layers, he's so pleased to see crick through temenos' eyes. not so dead. he plans to poke at the priest after, thankful for being presented a lighter memory. one of temenos negging his almost-boyfriend before they both turn in for the night.
but that's not what people like temenos get. if you seek the truth of the world, it's never pretty.
crick is murdered. worse than if he'd betrayed temenos and lived on, he's a naive and noble corpse. he becomes a weight upon the inquisitor's conscience. like always.
nodd could have questions. it's his nature to pry and pry and pry, to push and badger. but when he feels, however short, temenos' rage inside of him, his jaw locks.
that was none of his business. that was cruel to have shared without temenos' desiring it.
after a moment, he merely reaches out a hand which hovers by temenos' shoulder. if he wants to run away, today, priestboy allowed. ]
there's a long, long, long silence when the memory finishes. temenos looks back out at the void itself, like he's still watching that blue-flame ghost slip away from his fingers. he's relieved this now, how many times?
even without touching his shoulder, nodd can likely feel that temenos is tense, tense, tense. and slowly, he exhales, forces himself to relax. the mask, practically sewn onto his face. the reaction - or the lack thereof - methodical. ]
I told you, didn't I? [ temenos says - and there's a wryness to it, something rueful. he told him. that knight is dead. ]
[ no one arc of memories will sum up a person, but this offers insight beyond what a sly skrunkle like temenos would normally allow. nodd, to his credit, will say little else. now he knows and there's no benefit to pushing temenos' nose in it.
won't even do that later in the arcade. won't mention at all. a chance to prove himself as a locked vault when it matters and he takes it. ]
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...and you're standing in the too-silent cathedral alone, the world in its normal light, carrying only the ghosts you always do. ]
I'm going to find the truth, Crick. [ you say, out loud. his ghost is gone now, but you promise him anyway. ] The truth you were diligently working towards.
[ and you step off into the darkness.
in the belly of the proverbial beast, you find the book crick tore his page from - you find a secret library, and you find the deputy of the crows, who informs you with a cackle that it was the head of their ilk who killed crick - that he had to die because he knew too much. you, by leading him to the truth, led him straight to the lion's den.
you're so angry, suddenly. angry for the injustice of it all. angry for crick, angry for the pontiff, angry that your intuition about these gods-damned crows has always been right, angry enough that it shows on your face when you ask where kaldena is.
the deputy points it out, and mocks you. "Does it hurt, knowing your cute little assistant's been killed?"
you don't respond, lest she know that she's right. the deputy tells you cheerfully that kaldena's gone, and you have to die, that the hound must be brought to heel, and you draw the staff of judgement with a kind of quiet, holy fury that you never show. ]
Fine. [ you snap. you're so angry. you're so angry, and heartbroken, and - you have to keep moving forward. the truth waits for no grief. no sorrow. the truth lies in the flame. you take a battle stance; the other travelers follow behind. ] Seal your lips, you so called messenger of the divine
[ with the aid of the other travelers, you will walk out of here alive, and leave cubaryi dead on the floor.
because the truth, the truth that crick wellsley fought to find, must be brought to light. ]
no subject
nodd, too. a romantic, underneath the caked on layers, he's so pleased to see crick through temenos' eyes. not so dead. he plans to poke at the priest after, thankful for being presented a lighter memory. one of temenos negging his almost-boyfriend before they both turn in for the night.
but that's not what people like temenos get. if you seek the truth of the world, it's never pretty.
crick is murdered. worse than if he'd betrayed temenos and lived on, he's a naive and noble corpse. he becomes a weight upon the inquisitor's conscience. like always.
nodd could have questions. it's his nature to pry and pry and pry, to push and badger. but when he feels, however short, temenos' rage inside of him, his jaw locks.
that was none of his business. that was cruel to have shared without temenos' desiring it.
after a moment, he merely reaches out a hand which hovers by temenos' shoulder. if he wants to run away, today, priestboy allowed. ]
no subject
there's a long, long, long silence when the memory finishes. temenos looks back out at the void itself, like he's still watching that blue-flame ghost slip away from his fingers. he's relieved this now, how many times?
even without touching his shoulder, nodd can likely feel that temenos is tense, tense, tense. and slowly, he exhales, forces himself to relax. the mask, practically sewn onto his face. the reaction - or the lack thereof - methodical. ]
I told you, didn't I? [ temenos says - and there's a wryness to it, something rueful. he told him. that knight is dead. ]
no subject
[ no one arc of memories will sum up a person, but this offers insight beyond what a sly skrunkle like temenos would normally allow. nodd, to his credit, will say little else. now he knows and there's no benefit to pushing temenos' nose in it.
won't even do that later in the arcade. won't mention at all. a chance to prove himself as a locked vault when it matters and he takes it. ]